


and the marrow

by icemachine



Series: teeth to the loves and the curses [2]
Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Eventual Happy Ending, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Other: See Story Notes, god it's been a while huh!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-26
Updated: 2019-02-26
Packaged: 2019-11-05 23:02:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17928056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icemachine/pseuds/icemachine
Summary: “Turlough, look at me.”The voice is distorted; T u r L O U gh L o O O O K a T M  e e . The voice is deep, and distorted, and chilling. Turlough still does not open his eyes.How can he open his eyes? What is there to look at? Another monster? A monster on top of a monster? A monster touching another monster? A monster loving another monster?“It’s me. Turlough, it’s me, it’s the Doctor.”“Stop lying to me,” Turlough spits; his eyes do not burn, his teeth do not extend.





	and the marrow

**Author's Note:**

> It's been so long y'all! Almost a year since I finished the main fic. (I know it says I published it in August 2018, but I had difficulties with uploading it prior to that, for personal reasons). I'm sick and tired so naturally I decided to revisit BTTI. 
> 
> This will make negative three sense unless you have read [bone to the ire.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15541782/chapters/36078975)

He cannot feel the Doctor anymore. 

 

He feels like he has been emptied, body scraped and licked clean, bones entirely white; the Doctor has been torn from him, cut away -

 

he is alone, longs for something to fill him up again, to put the  _ stars  _ back into him, but he is alone, alone, look at the abandoned house that is Turlough’s body, look at the lack of energy, just dead in the air. He does not know how to make it in this world. He is too broken to be alone, and too alone to be broken.

 

The hollowness hits immediately & the surrounding room is entirely white, the familiarity biting down into him - he would think he was back in the temple if there wasn’t some mechanical soft hum going through his ears, if he couldn’t feel the temperature around him -  _ oh - he can finally  _

 

_ f _

 

_ e _

 

_ e _

 

_ l _

 

things like temperature and air and depth.

 

He wants the Doctor to experience it. He wants the Doctor, he wants. 

 

And something takes his hand.

 

He can’t make himself look; he can still feel the Doctor’s heart, pulsing in his mind, the very core of the Doctor’s being  _ he is finally inside of the Doctor and it is not right, it is monstrous & he holds _

 

_ the very core of the Doctor’s being _

 

_ and tears it out. He has a spare. _

 

And something takes his hand.

 

He doesn’t look.

 

And something moves between his fingers.

 

He cannot look; his eyelids have been tied down, sewn right up, punishment.

 

And someone says his name.

  
  


“Turlough.”

  
  


Turlough’s eyes do not open. He has heard stories about opening eyes---and the draining of innocence—and the inherent pain, the etched in suffering; he does not open his eyes, only squeezes his hand tighter, tighter. There’s soft, sharp breath against his skin. A slight, injured moan.

 

“Turlough, look at me.”

 

The voice is distorted;  _ T u r L O U gh L o O O O K a T M  e e .  _ The voice is deep, and distorted, and chilling. Turlough still does not open his eyes.

 

How can he open his eyes? What is there to look at? Another monster? A monster on top of a monster? A monster touching another monster? A monster loving another monster?

 

“It’s me. Turlough, it’s me, it’s the Doctor.”

 

“Stop  _ lying  _ to me,” Turlough spits; his eyes do not burn, his teeth do not extend. He can feel the heat move through his body---anger, like a torched ghost---fear---hatred for whatever is claiming to be the Doctor, whatever is claiming to be love. How can he trust his senses---the  _ world  _ itself, in its turns and trembles---when they have all deceived him?

 

“I’m not lying,” says the “Doctor”, stripping Turlough of all strength. One simple claw at the skin---and Turlough is weak again. “Please, you have to trust me.”

 

“Prove it. Prove that you are the Doctor and not a mind trick.”

 

There is a moment of silence, respect for the fallen angels and the fallen Turlough, until the “Doctor” frees himself from the webs of Turlough’s fingers and caresses his face instead.

 

“You’re not a monster, Turlough.”

 

Turlough opens his eyes. Buried in another dimension, eyes are opening at the same time, innocently and draped in corruption. It almost stings of beauty---the complexity of eye-opening, that is, and how it can mean new life & pleasure & a strained, collapsed sense of peace.

 

& Turlough feels the touch on every layer of his body, the outer skin of his face, through his muscles and whatever else lies beneath.

 

“Where are we?”

 

The Doctor aids him to his feet. They both look around, searching for the vile man. Are they in hell? Why are they together, when the Doctor was so prepared to leave him? Did the entity kill them both?

 

The Doctor hears the whirring noises, soft machinery working and ticking all around him, and he smiles, true genuine joy. “We’re back in my ship.” He rests a hand softly on the console. “I missed you, old girl.”

 

“But how do you know it’s really your ship and not a simulation?”

 

“I don’t, not really. But I think there’s a way to test that.”

 

“And what’s that?” Turlough asks, crossing his arms and staring through the Doctor’s skin, studying him for any sign of disbelief. There are no signs of disbelief. That’s the thing about the Doctor; he’s always so  _ sincere. _

 

“Watch.”

 

The Doctor presses several buttons on the console, pulls a few levers, twists a few dials & the ship makes a motion that Turlough only knows as a descent. It throws him, violently, into the pathway of the Doctor.

 

“She’s a bit creaky. I wonder how long it’s been since… well, you know.”

 

“I don’t think I want to know how long it’s been.”

 

The Doctor ignores him, continuing to frantically check several monitors. “If she feels like sending us to the right place, we should end up on October 31st, 1517. The nailing of the ninety-five theses onto the church by Martin Luther, and the onset of the Reformation.”

 

“The what?”

 

The Doctor shakes his head. “Nevermind. It’s just a test, to see if this is all real. I tried to choose an arbitrary historical event, one that the entity probably wouldn’t think of preparing in a simulation.”

 

“I see.”

 

Turlough can feel his viscera twist---this wait is unbearable. It has only been a few minutes, but his sense of time is still skewed.

 

On instinct, he feels real, he can touch and sense now, he can be his own universe.

 

Logically, however, he has trained himself to remove any kind of instinctive knowledge.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> tune in for more distress, coming soon!


End file.
